The Trinity and the Christian

By Kenneth Daughters

Introduction

When the average Christian is asked about the Trinity, he is content to quote a brief definition. Were he challenged to contemplate the meaning of the Trinity, he would quickly struggle. Few Christians have ever taken the time or trouble to think deeply on the subject. To most it is as abstract as a complicated mathematical expression. How sad! Actually, the Trinity is God’s highest revelation of himself. Far from being a subject that is too deep to be relevant, God intended for man to order his world in light of it. All forms of unity and diversity in the universe find their source in the nature of God as triune.

It is impossible to adequately understand God without understanding him as triune. To try to relate to God as a mono-personal being is to ignore his revelation to us and to deny his beauty. Some consider the concept of the Trinity too difficult to comprehend, so they operate in a functional denial of God’s Trinitarian nature. Others attempt to understand the Trinity but fall short, conceiving him in a modalistic or tritheistic form. Not only have they failed to understand God and relate to him properly but they also have no basis for accurately balancing the unity and diversity all about them.

We should not be surprised that God’s nature and being is different than what we would expect. Did he not say, “‘To whom then will you liken Me that I would be his equal?’ says the Holy One” (Isaiah 40:25). And again, “‘For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways,’ declares the Lord. ‘For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts’” (Isa. 55:8–9). We have no right to expect God’s nature to match our preconceived notions. He is far more complex than we realize.

We should accept God’s revelation of himself. Since he has revealed himself as triune, we are responsible to understand and relate to him in such a manner. We must learn to appreciate and worship him as triune. It should affect how we receive and express love back to him. It should affect how we serve him. A major problem is that we do not understand this doctrine well enough to apply it practically. Most of us are too complacent in our immature understanding of God’s Trinitarian nature. We need to think more deeply on this subject.

One of the best simple definitions of the Trinity is given by James R. White: “Within the one Being that is God, there exists eternally three coequal and coeternal Persons, namely the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.” [1] This adequately expresses the orthodox doctrine. However, heretics and cultists misunderstand the church’s expression of God’s revelation. They think that we are saying there are three beings that are one being. Obviously we have not said that. That would be self-contradictory. The truth is that while there is only one God, there are three divine persons within the Godhead. Others make the mistake of going to another extreme and think that God is one person who merely exists in three modes: Father, Son and Spirit. This is Modalism, and it has correctly been rejected by the church as heretical. We must return to the core of what it means that God is both three and one, because he is three in one.

The Trinity is God’s highest revelation of himself, and the doctrine is worthy of our effort to understand and appreciate it. Our problem is that God is so wholly other than us, it is difficult for us as creatures to understand him. He is unlike anything that we could possibly imagine. He is completely unique. There is a mystery to his being. We only know him as he reveals himself to us. Thankfully, he has communicated to us in multiple dimensions. He has given us a number of illustrations on the human level to aid us in our quest to appreciate him.

Love

What is the center of God’s revelation to us as well as the center of his relationship with us? I would suggest that it is his love. It is often suggested that the core attribute of God’s being is his holiness. But holiness relates more to the description of his righteous standards compared to the perversions of our sin. Holiness relates to our separation from God and our need of salvation. It is better to see the center of God’s communication to us in his love and how he has treated us graciously. His gracious love is expressed through the incarnation and in our redemption and gives us an essential understanding of God himself.

When I first began to study and meditate on the Trinity, I tried to think completely in orthodox terms, not wishing in any way to express theological error. Knowing the heresies that have resulted from God’s Word being rejected, perverted, and misunderstood, I wished to remain safely within the box of orthodoxy. But if I merely say that God is both one and three and three in one, then I am not truly understanding him as a person nor appreciating him for who he is. We best understand God when we penetrate into his revelation to us through his Son Jesus Christ, his desire to save us, and his desire to express his love to us.

To think deeply on the Trinity is to think deeply about God’s love for us expressed through his Son. Jonathan Edwards had an “ah ha” experience like this and wrote of it in his personal narrative:

Sometimes, only mentioning a single word caused my heart to burn within me; or only seeing the name of Christ, or the name of some attribute of God. And God has appeared glorious to me, on account of the Trinity. It has made me have exalting thoughts of God, that he subsists in three persons; the Father, Son and Holy Ghost. The sweetest joys and delights I have experienced, have not been those that have arisen from a hope of my own good estate; but in a direct view of the glorious things of the gospel.… 

Once I rode out into the woods for my health, in 1737, having alighted from my horse in a retired place, as my manner commonly has been, to walk for divine contemplation and prayer, I had a view, that for me was extraordinary, of the glory of the Son of God, as Mediator between God and man, and his wonderful, great, full, pure and sweet grace and love, and meek and gentle condescension. This grace that appeared so calm and sweet, appeared also great above the heavens. The person of Christ appeared ineffably excellent, with an excellency great enough to swallow up all thought and conception—which continued, as near as I can judge, about an hour; which kept me the greater part of the time in a flood of tears and weeping aloud. I felt an ardency of soul to be, what I know not otherwise how to express, emptied and annihilated; to lie in the dust, and to be full of Christ alone; to love him with a holy and pure love; to trust in him; to live upon him; to serve and follow him; and to be perfectly sanctified and made pure, with a divine and heavenly purity. I have, several other times, had views very much of the same nature, and which had the same effects.” [2]

If we have not had similar experiences, perhaps it is because we have not thought deeply enough regarding God’s nature and his expression of love.

Psychologists tell us that our deepest need is to be loved and to feel love. Theologians tell us that the Trinity is Christianity [3] and that the best quest of the human being is to know God. To know God deeply and fully is to know him as Trinitarian. But to know him as the Trinity is to know him through his expression of love to us, through his willingness to send his Son to become man with us, to die in our place and to redeem us, and to bring us into fellowship with himself. It is also revealed through the ministry of the indwelling Spirit, allowing us to have personal, intimate, and regular communication with God.

Let us return again to our central question and desire to find the practical significance of the doctrine of the Trinity. We have to ask ourselves, “Why the Trinity?” Consider this: Love existed as an attribute of the eternal God even before he created us. How can a solitary being demonstrate love? Does not love require an object? Could there be interpersonal relationships before God created anyone else? Was love flowing among the members of the Godhead, the persons of the Trinity, before creation? [4]

Interestingly, in the 12th century, Richard of St. Victor claimed that all real love requires both a giver and a receiver. He asserted that love is essentially other-directed. But for God, creatures are insufficiently spacious receivers and depressingly low wattage transmitters of love; hence, said Richard, “There must be at least two persons in God Himself. Yet God is also perfectly good. A thoroughly good being would not jealously protect two-person love, but would generously share love with a third.” Hence, Richard said, “In order for love to be true, it demands a plurality of persons. In order for the love to be perfected, it requires a Trinity of persons.” [5]

What if God were not Trinitarian, but instead, a divine monad? How personal would he be? If the persons within the Trinity relate to themselves in love, perhaps we have discovered a rubric by which we may understand his desire to have a relationship with us. [6] We all wonder why he made us. Was he not sufficient in himself? Did he need us?

God is independent enough that he is not absolutely in need of us; but God as Trinity, enjoying the loving relationship of the three persons within the Godhead, [7] has desired to extend that relationship even to us! Hence he created us as beings that could relate to him. The reason he created us was to be in relationship with us. That desire is at the core of who he is as God. He is a relational Being. He is a loving Being. He desires to express his love to us. That is why he created us.

Relationships

As we think about ourselves we are able, by way of illustration, to have a faint picture of God. We are lonely when we are by ourselves. Those who live by themselves can hardly stand the loneliness and are almost always finding something to which they can express love. Many lonely people living by themselves own a pet, such as a dog. That dog becomes so much a part of the “family” that when a Christmas card is sent out, the picture is of the person and his dog, as if it were a member of the family.

We have been created as relational beings. This may be seen in marriage. The desire of the husband and wife is for each other, and they find great fulfillment in loving each other. Yet their love becomes more perfectly expressed when they produce a child and together love that child. There is no greater love that we show in a familial sense than when the husband and wife, the mother and father, take their eyes off themselves and direct their loving attention to an infant baby that needs all their care. This forms an illustration of God’s desire to create and love us. He not only loves us, he greatly enjoys receiving our love in return. He enjoys this relationship with us. Our relationship with God better illustrates the concept of God as Trinity than it does the concept of God as a divine monad. [8]

God joined the human race as the God-man to establish our relationship with him and improve our understanding of him. God made us the way we are so that we could understand him better. Within the Trinity the Father-Son relationship helps us understand ourselves. And we have a faint glimpse of the Trinity in our own human family as our father and son relationships help us understand the relationship between God the Father and God the Son. It has made it more possible for us to comprehend him.

Image

Another illustration of the Trinity is found in the manner by which we reflect God’s image. God said he created us in his own image. There are clues in the complexity of the creation of man as male and female that would open us to the concept of complexity in God’s nature. “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule…. God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them” (Genesis 1:26–27).

When God created man, the man was incomplete without his partner, the woman. Mankind is complex, consisting of two complementary genders. Each needs the other. This complexity in man is a faint picture of the complexity of God. God is one. And yet God is complex in that in one being he is also three persons.

God intended man to live in a series of relationships. He did not intend for man to be alone. That is why he instituted marriage. That is why we live in family units. The church is like a body with interdependent parts. Government regulates our societal relationships. Why are there so many relationships? It is a reflection of God’s own nature. God is relational, and he is teaching us to improve as relational beings. He wants us to relate to each other in a manner that reflects how he relates within himself as Trinity. He also desires more perfect fellowship with us. This takes place as we improve our relationship with him by understanding him more deeply.

Incarnation

God has created us in his image, poured out his love to us, and placed us in a relationship with himself and with others. Yet the greatest act of triune revelation was the incarnation. We understand the Trinity best when we unlock the mysteries of Jesus Christ as God incarnate.

We read in Hebrews 1:1–5:

God, after He spoke long ago to the fathers in the prophets in many portions and in many ways, in these last days has spoken to us in His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the world. And He is the radiance of His glory and the exact representation of His nature, and upholds all things by the word of His power. When He had made purification of sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high, having become as much better than the angels, as He has inherited a more excellent name than they. For to which of the angels did He ever say, “You are my Son, today I have begotten You”? And again, “I will be a father to Him and He shall be a Son to Me”?

The doctrine of the Trinity is found in both testaments, but it is more clearly revealed in the New Testament because of the incarnation. God speaks to us through his Son, who accurately portrays God’s nature and radiates his glory.

Why did God wait until New Testament times to most clearly reveal himself as triune? Why was the Old Testament more obscure on this subject? B. B. Warfield illustrates God’s plan well when he writes:

The Old Testament may be likened to a chamber richly furnished but dimly lighted; the introduction of light brings into it nothing which was not in it before; but it brings out into clearer view much of what is in it but was only dimly or even not at all perceived before. The mystery of the Trinity is not revealed in the Old Testament; but the mystery of the Trinity underlies the Old Testament revelation, and here and there almost comes into view. Thus the Old Testament revelation of God is not corrected by the fuller revelation which follows it, but only perfected, extended and enlarged. [9]

The Trinity is explained best in the New Testament because that is the time when God became one of us. God the Father sent his Son to become man. The Son joined the human race to die in our place as our Savior. The Trinity is revealed by the Son coming in redemption and the Spirit indwelling the church. Were it not for this revelation of God to us through the incarnation of the Son and the indwelling of the Spirit, God would seem more far off, distant, and misunderstood.

As a father and a theologian I seek to the best of my ability to explain the Trinity to my children. My grade-school children can repeat back to me that Jesus is God. That is almost the Trinity in a nutshell—the admission that Jesus the man is also God. But it is still difficult for them to comprehend the doctrine. What helps them most is to learn the Bible stories of Jesus’ life, actions and teachings. When they see how Jesus lived among us, they learn the attributes of God as they are worked out in daily life. When they learn to love Jesus, they are learning to relate to God. My little ones are coming to understand God’s attributes through the simple means of seeing them displayed in his Son, Jesus Christ.

John 1:18 reads, “No one has seen God at any time; the only begotten God who is in the bosom of the Father, He has explained [exegeted] Him.” This is God’s best explanation of himself to us. Since he is Spirit, so different from us, we find it difficult to comprehend him. The Son explains him to us. His life testifies to God’s attributes.

We might think that the Son’s revelation of the Father would be inadequate. Jesus assured Philip that all that he sought in his desire to know the Father could be found in the Son. He did not need to see the Father to understand him; Jesus lived out the Father’s will. They share the same essence. They are both God.

“Have I been so long with you, and yet you have not come to know Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; how can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in Me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on My own initiative, but the Father abiding in Me does His works. Believe me, that I am in the Father and the Father in me” (John 14:9–11).

If we want to know God, we must approach him through the Son. “All things have been handed over to me by my Father; and no one knows the Son except the Father; nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and anyone to whom the Son wills to reveal Him” (Matthew 11:27). We know the Father through first knowing his Son. It is in the personal communion that we have through his Spirit that we come to have fellowship with him, and hence appreciate him and reciprocate love to him as he has desired. “And we know that the Son of God has come, and has given us understanding so that we may know Him who is true; and we are in Him who is true, in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life” (1 John 5:20).

All the treasures of God’s wisdom and knowledge are found in a personal relationship with his Son. Knowing him enables us to love one other with a godly love. “That their hearts may be encouraged, having been knit together in love, and attaining to all the wealth that comes from the full assurance of understanding, resulting in a true knowledge of God’s mystery, that is, Christ Himself, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Col. 2:2–3).

Redemption

God created us for himself so that he could enjoy a relationship with us. We ruined that when we rebelled in sin. God’s plan was to reveal his attributes of grace and love through the incarnation of his Son. His plan was to redeem us. The Son would die in our place, taking our sins upon himself, so that those who believe in him could enter into an eternal relationship with God. “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life. For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him” (John 3:16–17).

God’s redemption of us reveals his Trinitarian nature to us. How is it possible for us to be saved? Only God can save. [10] And we need God to save us in a manner in which we can actually have a relationship with him. God cannot die. How can the death of one pay the penalty for the many? The value of Christ’s death needed to be infinite. This was accomplished through the incarnation. We need a God-man to be our mediator and to atone for us. If God were a divine monad and not a Trinity, how could he be our judge standing against our sin? [11] How could he be our Savior dying in our place for us? How could he be the Sanctifier bringing us into a complete relationship with himself, without God being triune? The Trinity makes it possible for God to save us.

In previous centuries, heretics sought to explain the Trinity in simplified terms, thinking they were improving our understanding. They regularly destroyed the Son’s relationship to the Father in these attempts. The Arians, for example, made the Logos the greatest of creatures, but still a creature. If Jesus Christ is not fully God, can he truly save us? Can we trust in a creature? Can we credit a creature for our salvation? Can a creature actually save us? If the Logos is a changeable creature, how can we be sure that we have an accurate revelation of God from him? How can we be sure that we really have an accurate understanding of salvation?

Why did God join the human race as the God-man? He did not become an angel. Angels were created as individuals. Angels do not marry and reproduce. They are not genetically tied to one another. But we as human beings, created in the image of God, are all genetically related one to the other. We are one people descended from one individual. The act of that one person has affected us all. Adam’s disobedience made us sinners (Rom. 5:12, 19). But Christ has become the head of a new race, and his obedience makes us righteous (Romans 5:19). This is only possible because God became one of us.

Applications

Worship

Is the doctrine of the Trinity practical? Does it affect the way we live? Does it change the way we understand God? Indeed it does! Since God has called us to worship him, we need to make our worship Trinitarian. We need to worship God as he has revealed himself. “Almost every single imbalance in worship is due to a corresponding imbalance in our view of God.” [12] We should understand who the Father is and his place within the Trinity. We should likewise understand the Son and the Spirit and their place within the Trinity. This will affect the way we worship.

Is Trinitarian worship taught to us in the Scripture, or is it merely speculative? Is it appropriate to worship the Son directly for what he has done? Scripture indicates that the Father delights in our worship of the Son. There is no jealousy in the Trinity. Besides, the Son reflects any glory he receives back to his Father. Speaking of his condescension to become one of us and his willingness to die in our place, we read, “For this reason also, God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under earth, and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of the Father” (Phil. 2:9–11).

We have examples in Scripture where the specific members of the Godhead are distinguished and where praise and worship are directed to each person. In Revelation 5:11–14 the Father and Son are each marked out as objects of worship for their work of salvation:

Then I looked, and I heard the voice of many angels around the throne and the living creatures and the elders; and the number of them was myriads of myriads, and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice, “Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power and riches and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing.” And every created thing which is in heaven and on the earth and under the earth and on the sea, and all things in them, I heard saying, “To Him who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb, be blessing and honor and glory and dominion forever and ever.” And the four living creatures kept saying, “Amen.” And the elders fell down and worshiped.

Another example is found in Ephesians 1. The Father is described as the one who chose us, the Son is the one who redeemed us, and the Spirit is the one who sealed us. At the end of each stanza of this Trinitarian worship is the doxology, “To the praise of the glory of His grace,” (Eph. 1:6, 12, 14). Each person is extolled for his individual work in our salvation.

These examples demonstrate that it is entirely appropriate to worship in a Trinitarian form, expressing our appreciation and our love for what God himself has done for us, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit—three in One.

Prayer

Similarly, when we pray, we should pray in a Trinitarian manner. When his disciples asked Jesus, “Teach us to pray” in Matthew 6:9, he said, “Pray, then, in this way: ‘Our Father who is in heaven, hallowed be Your name.” And so we address God as our Father, and as adopted children in the family of God, we relate to him as children of the heavenly Father.

And as we pray, it is the Son who gives us access to the Father. It is the advocacy of the Son on our behalf that makes it possible for us to come into the presence of the Father and speak freely before him. We read in 1 John 2:1, “My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.” We also have the right to ask Jesus directly to answer our prayers. The Lord himself said in John 14:14, “If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it.” We can also carry out the Son’s plan for us and accomplish his work in the church by asking for his empowerment.

Finally, the Holy Spirit has a key role in our prayers. In Ephesians 6:18 we read, “With all prayer and petition pray at all times in the Spirit.” All of our prayers are to be prayed with the help of the Spirit guiding us and interpreting our prayers in a manner that is acceptable to and receivable by God. Romans 8:26–27 says, “In the same way the Spirit also helps our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we should, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words; and He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.”

Body Life

Our growing understanding of the Trinity should affect how we relate to each other within the church. Our relationships with each other within the church are to be informed by our understanding of the nature of God’s being—as unity within diversity. God’s perfect love and unity within the Godhead is a model for our relationships with one another. It is a model of harmony for us. In the church we have many members, yet we are one body. The church reflects great diversity and yet great unity. It ought to illustrate the Trinity. “For even as the body is one and yet has many members, and all the members of the body, though they are many, are one body, so also is Christ” (1 Cor. 12:12).

The relationship of the Father and the Son also gives us an understanding of authority and subjection in human relationships. The Son was willing to be the suffering servant of the Father. He was willing to submit to the Father and to carry out the Father’s will. This kind of subordination is a function of order, office, and operation, not of essence or being. Difference in function does not imply inferiority of nature. Roles distinguish service and function, not value or worth. [13] In 1 Corinthians 12 Paul says that the human body is an illustration of the church. The body functions because of the diversity of its members. In the church we cannot all be the same member of the body and have the same function. We cannot jealously wish we had a different place in the body. Each part is equally necessary in order for the body to function properly, even though the role, place, and function of each member within the body is different.

Gifts

This is seen in the way in which the Holy Spirit has sovereignly distributed spiritual gifts to each believer. He has not given each of us the same gift but has sovereignly given us different gifts to complement each other. He has made us diverse. “And He gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers, for the equipping the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ” (Eph. 4:11–12). The purpose of this diversity is to increase our ability to minister to one another. We need different offices, roles, and functions. Though some of us are male, some female, some Jewish, some Gentile, though some are slaves, and others free, we are all one in Christ ministering for the mutual edification of the body “until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ” (Eph. 4:13). Our understanding of the Trinity as applied to relationships within the church demonstrates that there can be unity in diversity, that there is advantage in diversity, and that role distinction does not imply inferiority.

Race

In the history of mankind, one of the most divisive barriers to unity has been race and culture. In keeping with his character, the Trinitarian God has broken down the barrier of race and has made us one in Christ, one new man. The church here also serves as an earthly illustration of the Trinity. “For He Himself is our peace, who made both groups into one and broke down the barrier of the dividing wall, by abolishing in His flesh the enmity, which is the Law of commandments contained in ordinances, so that in Himself He might make the two into one new man, thus establishing peace, and might reconcile them both in one body through the cross, by it having put to death the enmity” (Eph. 2:14–16). When we are joined to Christ, we retain our race, social status, and gender. Yet these things no longer function as a barriers between us. We are all children of God. “For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. For all of you who are baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus” (Gal. 3:26–28).

Church

The mystery of the unity within diversity in the Trinity is also illustrated by the mysterious unity between Christ and church, which is his bride. It is further illustrated by marriage and the relationship between husband and wife. Each of these institutions has been created as an illustration and reflection of God’s own nature. Christ’s love for his church is so great that he gave himself up for her. So we are to emulate his example in our own marriages and in the church. We live in interdependent community with each other. We are not to live for ourselves, but are to serve the other out of love.

Be subject to one another in the fear of Christ. Wives, be subject to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ also is the head of the church, He Himself being the Savior of the body. But as the church is subject to Christ, so also the wives ought to be to their husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her, so that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless (Ephesians 5:21–27).

We need not fear that increased unity will obliterate our individual personalities. In the being of God we have infinite unity combined with the preservation of distinct personalities.

Marriage

Why has God created marriage in such a way that two individuals relate to each other as husband and wife? In marriage we see an illustration of the Trinity. The Father is to the Son as the husband is to his wife in marriage. Furthermore, children inside of a family are in some ways analogous to the Spirit coming from and being subject to the authority of the parents. Persons remain distinct individuals, yet they also become one in body, mind and spirit. The marriage is a joining of two people together. We read in Genesis 2:24, “For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother, and be joined to his wife; and they shall become one flesh.” This is quoted again in Ephesians 5:31. The institution of marriage was created by God to help us understand that we are meant to be relational beings. God himself gave the first bride away. When he created Adam, he said, “It is not good for man to be alone. I will make him a helper suitable for him.” The intimacy of marriage, two becoming one flesh, is meant to be a picture to help us understand the intimacy of the relationships within the Trinity. It even reflects authority within relationships. We read in 1 Corinthians 11:3, “But I want you to understand that Christ is the head of every man, and the man is the head of a woman, and God is the head of Christ.” We learn, from our understanding of God, what marriage is to be like. It is to be equal in constitution, in importance, and in personhood, while at the same time evidencing authority and submissiveness and differences in role.

Our families are patterned after the Trinity. The concept of father gives us our familial security. Sons are supposed to learn submissive obedience. The Spirit is seen as the one who empowers and gives us fellowship. If we understand our own family, we can better understand the Trinity. In Genesis 22 God asked Abraham to offer up his son Isaac as a sacrifice. We can readily imagine what it would feel like to be asked to sacrifice one of our own children. What loss we would suffer! Only a great love for a higher good would move us to make such a sacrifice. This is meant to intimate for us what it was like for God himself as triune to send his Son to earth and to turn his back on him on the cross.

Society

The truths that are gleaned from God’s nature as triune also apply to how individuals function in society. We were not intended to function in isolation as hermits. God created us as relational beings meant to interact with each so as to help one another love and serve God. We will not be authentically fulfilled unless we are functioning well in relationship to others in society. We cannot retreat into ourselves and ignore others. Ward writes:

The truth of the Trinity helps us understand the nature of personhood (and I would add, “in relation to others”). The modern world thinks in terms of self-contained individuality and thus of the separation of one person from another. However, the biblical presentation would encourage us to understand personhood as individuality realized adequately only in community. God is supremely personal, and his own Trinitarian life is characterized by fellowship and communion, and intimacy of loving relationship and reciprocity. [14]

Universe

The doctrine of the Trinity also applies to our understanding of the universe. If there were no Trinity, then there would be no basis for thinking that there could be any ultimate unity among the diverse elements of the universe. The Trinitarian existence of God is the fundamental basis for all combinations of unity and diversity. On a micro scale we can see this in the harmonious workings of the various and necessary parts of our human body. On a macro scale we can see this in the interdependence of environmental systems on the earth.

Conclusion

The doctrine of the Trinity is not to be reserved for speculative debate among esoteric theologians. It is to be cherished by all of God’s children as the revelation of God’s beautiful nature. Without an understanding of God as triune, we would not have the key to unlock many of the mysteries of how we are to function in the universe. All forms of unity in diversity can find their origin in God’s nature. Since the fall of man we have imagined that the differences among us must mean the superiority of some and the inferiority of others. We have learned from the Trinity that difference does not automatically imply deficiency. There can be equality in diversity, with distinction of function and role. There is even advantage to plurality and diversity, because some things are impossible to accomplish alone. We have also learned that we have been created to function in relationship to God and others. We fail if we seek to function independently and alone. As Jesus said, “Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me…for apart from Me you can do nothing” (John 15:4–5).

Notes

1. James R. White, “Loving the Trinity,” Christian Research Journal 21(1999): 23.
2. Jonathan Edwards, “Memoirs of Jonathan Edwards, A.M.,” in The Works of Jonathan Edwards, 2 vols. (Edinburgh: The Banner of Truth Trust, 1974 [=1834]): 1:xlvii.
3. William G. T. Shedd, “Introductory Essay [to Augustine’s On the Trinity]” in Philip Schaff, ed., The Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series I, 14 vols. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1956 [=1887]): 3:10.
4. “More pregnant is the suggestion of Augustine that without the Trinity there could be no fellowship or love in God, the divine triunity involving an interrelationship in which the divine perfections find eternal exercise and expression independent of the creation of the world and man.” G. W. Bromiley, “Trinity,” Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, ed. Walter A. Elwell (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1984), 1112.
5. Quoted by Cornelius Plantinga, Jr. “The Perfect Family,” Christianity Today (March 4, 1988), 24.
6. “Although one, God is nevertheless a unity in diversity. The one God is the social Trinity, the fellowship of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Consequently, God is fundamentally relational. Hence it comes as no surprise that when God fashions the pinnacle of creation, a unity in diversity—humankind as male and female—emerges.” Stanley J. Grenz, “Theological Foundations for Male-Female Relationships,” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 41:4 (December 1988): 617.
7. For Augustine, “the one primordial God was not the Father, but the Trinity. The different persons found their cause not in some generation or procession, but in an inherently necessary interior relationship with each other. He developed this view by using a number of analogies, of which the most significant are mind and love. A mind knows itself because it conceives of its own existence; what is more, it must also love its self-conception. A lover cannot love without a beloved, and there is of necessity a love which flows between them but which is not strictly identical with either. From this Augustine deduced that God, in order to be himself, had to be a Trinity of persons, since otherwise neither his mind nor his love could function.” G. L. Bray, “Trinity,” New Dictionary of Theology, ed. J. I. Packer (Downers Grove: InterVarsity, 1988), 693.
8. “Thus authentic knowledge of God is essentially relational, by knowledge of both acquaintance and involvement.… Thus the divine revelation should be defined as God’s work of bringing us into, and sustaining us in our activity of thus knowing him, in love. For it is not a speculative and theoretical knowledge of God as philosophers debate about, but the personal experience of divine love, from the Father, through the Son, by the Holy Spirit, the gives Christian theology its distinctive form of knowing.” James M. Houston, “Spirituality and the Doctrine of the Trinity,” Christ in Our Place, eds. Trevor A. Hart and Daniel P. Thimell (Exeter: Paternoster, 1989), 67–68.
9. B. B. Warfield, “The Biblical Doctrine of the Trinity,” Biblical Doctrines, in The Works of Benjamin B. Warfield, 10 vols. (New York: Oxford, 1929) 2:141–142.
10. “The atonement is at stake. If Jesus is merely a created being and not fully God, then it is hard to see how he, a creature, could bear the full wrath of God against all of our sins. Could any creature, no matter how great, really save us?” Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1994), 247.
11. “A mono-personal God cannot be both just and the justifier.” Gregory L. Crosthwait, “What Difference Does the Trinity Make?” http://www.probe.org/docs/Trinitydiff.html
12. Millard J. Erickson, Christian Theology, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1988), 367.
13. “The function of one member of the Trinity may for a time be subordinate to one or both of the other members, but that does not mean he is in any way inferior in essence. Each of the three persons of the Trinity has had, for a period of time, a particular function unique to himself. This is to be understood as a temporary role for the purpose of accomplishing a given end, not a change in status or essence.… In like fashion, the Son did not become less than the Father during his earthly incarnation, but he did subordinate himself functionally to the Father’s will. Similarly, the Holy Spirit is now subordinated to the ministry of the Son (see John 14–16) as well as to the will of the Father, but this does not imply that he is less than they are.” Erickson, Christian Theology, 363.Roland S. Ward, “The One and Triune God and the Life of His People,” Reformed Theological Journal 12 (November 1996), 77.